Episode 435: 7 Brutal Truths I Wish I Knew in my 20s
Business isn’t always a winning situation. Many individuals find themselves stuck, waiting for that one unique idea to propel them to success.
In this episode, Adam Stott offers a harsh yet inspiring reality check about his seven brutal truths for people in their 20s. This episode is a roadmap for anyone stuck in their business careers, providing actionable advice to ignite progress and achieve unprecedented results.
Adam draws from his personal journey and extensive experience in entrepreneurship to break down crucial lessons that aspiring business owners need to embrace to reach their full potential.
Show Highlights:
- Execution is more vital than the initial business idea; diligence and commitment open the path to success.
- Seeking guidance from those who have already achieved what you aspire to reach is more effective than trying to learn everything from scratch.
- The journey of a business will evolve over time; where you start is not where you will necessarily finish.
- Focus on honing marketing, sales, and branding skills, as these are critical to business success.
- Ambition works as a mirror, reflecting not only on your own goals but also challenging perception and reactions of those around you.
Links Mentioned:
Get your Business Growth Secrets SUCCESS PLANNER for FREE and profit like a pro: https://adamstottplanner.com/free-book47315172
Adam’s website: https://adamstott.com/?el=Pod
Watch the Episode on Adam’s YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/adamstottcoach?el=Pod
Connect with Adam on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adamstottcoach/?el=Pod
Join Adam’s network on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-stott-coach/?el=Pod
Coaches, consultants, and business owners – lower your marketing costs, increase ticket prices, and get more high-ticket clients: https://3daybrandbuilderworkshop.com/start-here?el=Pod
Transcript:
Please note this is a verbatim transcription from the original audio and therefore may include some minor grammatical errors.
Adam Stott: You might be in your twenties, you might be in your thirties, you might be in your forties. You’re just frankly stuck in your business career. These seven brutal truths could be the wake up call that you’ve been looking for to smart you into action and get your results that you’ve never had before. So the first brutal truth that I wanna share with you in this video is that when I was in my twenties, I just had this mindset.
[00:00:29] I wanna start a business. I want to go and get going, but I need that, that one idea, I need that special idea that’s gonna gonna make it work and make it happen. And you know, if I get that special idea, then everything’s gonna be much easier. And I’ve seen that now having trained thousands of business owners, that many people get stuck in this way of thinking, where actually.
[00:00:51] It’s not gonna be an idea that takes you to having that great business. It’s not gonna be an idea that takes you to that financial freedom. It’s actually the execution. In fact, you could do anything and actually go and execute and be successful. You know, you could have a gardening business, you could have a cleaning business, you could have a recruitment business.
[00:01:10] There’s tons of ’em out there. You could just have your own version. Go and find your own clients. You don’t need something crazy unique. You just need something very simple that you put your work ethic into. That will create your results. And many people feel that the idea is everything, but actually the idea is worthless, completely worthless unless you have something else, which is the execution.
[00:01:35] So what do I mean by this? What I mean is for those of you watching, if you’ve been sitting on the fence, you wanted to build a business, but you have not gone and take the action because you just feel like the idea isn’t good enough, your idea is good enough, you should take the action, you should go and get it done.
[00:01:51] You should start making it happen and start progressing it. The sooner you do that, the sooner you’re gonna start to step into your success. I wish I’d known that in my twenties, ’cause it cost me years. I remember being in a place where I wanted to start a business for years, but I was just looking for that special thing.
[00:02:06] What’s the idea? What’s the idea? What’s the idea? And you know what I ended up doing? My first business was a finance business and I ended up doing that ’cause that’s what I was doing. I was doing finance for cars. So my tip for you. Is, do what you know, do what you’re passionate about and do what you’re good at.
[00:02:21] And guess what, if you don’t, if you’re not passionate about anything, do what you know and do what you’re good at. ’cause that makes the learning curve a lot shorter and gets you started faster. That’s brutal truth number one, right? So number two, and I, and I really wish I knew this because like when I started my first business, started my first business age 25.
[00:02:41] But from the age of 20 to the age of 25, I had dreams, I had vision, I had goals. And I was like, I wanna do it. I want to go and start this business, but I’m waiting on the idea and I dunno when I’m gonna find the idea and I’m waiting for this. And it was kind of like in this point of frustration, uh, which kept me stuck for a long, long, long, long time.
[00:02:59] And hopefully what we just said can break you out of that. But if I’d have known this and if I known number two, then I’d have been able to make much faster progress. So number two is what I call, Hey everyone, hope you’re enjoying the podcast. We’ve got a free training that I’m doing right now online from the comfort of your own home called Stand Out Brand.
[00:03:20] What this does is it shows business owners how to get noticed on social media, stand out. Get more leads and get more sales. So if you want to make more money in your business, head over to adam.com/sob. That’s adam.com/sob and join us on the free three-day workshop, standout brand. So number two is what I call.
[00:03:47] The transference of knowledge. So what you’ve got is you got an image here of a brain, number one and brain number two, and brain number one is your brain and brain. Number two is the knowledge that you want. Now, this is what you should seek if you want to get more success. You’ve got to find people that know what you want to know, and you’ve got to tell them to tell you.
[00:04:11] How to do it. The biggest problem that most people experience is, is what they do is they have no other brain that’s been on the journey that they want to go on. We’ll talk a little bit more about Jane in a minute, and they drive themselves crazy because they’re just like trying to ping ideas. What should I do?
[00:04:29] What should I do? What should I do? What should I do? What should I do? And they’re not getting the answers and it drives them absolutely nuts. But how do I know? Because that was me. I was in that situation where. I didn’t want to reach out. I didn’t want to find people that would walked the path. I wasn’t looking for people that walk the path, and I actually think it’s way easier now.
[00:04:47] I actually think it’s easier than, you know, when I started back in 2008 was when I started my first business and I was trying to figure all that stuff out on my own. What you’ve got now, you’ve got an explosion. Things here on YouTube. You’ve got hundreds and hundreds of books that have been written.
[00:05:00] You’ve got the ability to reach out to people worldwide. Go and find people. So if I were you and I was starting a business, or I was early in a business at this stage, I would just be looking to go and find as many people that have the knowledge that I want and get ’em to transfer it to me. That transference of knowledge.
[00:05:17] I’ve definitely learned this now. And back then I didn’t know it. What do I do now? Every time I wanna do something, I just find someone that’s done it and I pay them to tell me how to do it, or I help them with something, then ask ’em to help me to do it. So, you know, I do a value exchange. I value their knowledge and their information, and I try to either pay them or give them value and get them to tell me the information so I can go out and create the result.
[00:05:45] And if you start to subscribe to that mindset. And you start to think, well, who is it? ’cause this is the thing, rather than going, well, how do I, ’cause this is most people’s things. It’s like, how do I do this? That’s what many, many people think. And that’s the question they ask themselves. And when they ask themselves that question and they get stuck, why?
[00:06:04] Because they’ve not done it before. So when you ask a brain a question that’s not done something before, you’re not gonna get the answer you want. So instead of asking how. Ask yourself who? So you say, who has done this question mark? Because they can then transfer you the answers to the information that you need.
[00:06:26] So the second thing that I wish I knew and the brutal truth I wish I knew is who, not how that’s gonna make the difference to you. Let’s jump into brutal truth number three. So this is super important. Number three, and, and this is like crazy important because I see this all the time, right? We are, we’re training business owners in the masses.
[00:06:46] And every time you, you talk to someone, early stages, they’re like. And you say to ’em, okay, you need to start off and you need to do this and you need to go out and this should be your target market and you need to build your offer. So you’ve got your target market, you’ve got your offer. So if you imagine you know who you’re gonna sell your product to, service, you know what you’re gonna offer ’em, and you go out to market and you start offering that and you go and find your clients, you’re gonna know where to find ’em.
[00:07:08] All of this kind of jazz. So those three things are important. A lot of people get blocked ’cause they go, but I just don’t know if, um. I just dunno if like, that’s what I want to do and I, I don’t know if, you know, I don’t know if I wanna make that kind of offer and I, I don’t know if I wanna serve that kind of market and I don’t know if I’m gonna find that type of client.
[00:07:29] So they come up with all these blocks. Now the problem is if I’d have known this, ’cause I’ve done it many, many, many times, I like, I don’t know if I wanna do this. I dunno if I wanna do that. And it stopped me from getting started because I used to think, and this is what a lot of people think now that I see, is I used to think that where you start.
[00:07:48] Is where you end, but it couldn’t be any different. So actually where you start, you evolve. So as you are building a business, you’re taking action, you’re going on the journey. What you used to do is you become a very, very different person here as you are here and as you are here and as you are here. So basically the brutal truth is that.
[00:08:09] Where you start is not where you end, and in fact you reinvent yourself. When I started my first ever business, first ever business I started was a finance business. I was lending out money on behalf of finance companies, used to get commission financial services. That’s how I started, you know? And then I pivoted because it was like, okay, it’s 2008, not a good time to start a finance business.
[00:08:30] So I pivoted and I started doing cars, and in that point I built a car business. So here, I’m a finance business here. I’m a car business. And I was like, you know what? I don’t just do cars. I do car servicing, car mechanical, car body work, selling cars. So then I’m like, then I’ve gone from cars to automotive.
[00:08:49] And then I was like, you know what? I’m not really automotive anymore, and I started training businesses and actually I’m business and go on that journey. It’s like, actually now I’ve got business business training. I’ve got marketing business, I’ve got a PR business, I’ve got multiple businesses. I’m not just business training, I’m entrepreneur.
[00:09:09] How do I. I’ve been here going, well, what? Like, oh, I don’t want to do finance because I don’t wanna do finance for the rest of my life. And guess what? I would never have got started. So I truly feel that a lot of people do this. They don’t get started because they wanna, they want to be somewhere I. And they envision themselves at this point, and it’s too far away to actually get started.
[00:09:33] So instead it’s one foot in front of another, get started. Realize that at the beginning it’s not gonna be perfect. And as long as you start progressing, you can become that end goal that you want to be. So that is my brutal truth. Number three, let’s jump into. Number four. So my brutal truth number four is you’ve gotta be coachable.
[00:09:53] And we talked about the transference of knowledge earlier on and how one brain can feed you information from another brain, and that you should be finding these brains to go further. What is one of the problem? Well, a lot of people’s problems, they’re not actually coachable. When I started my first business, I got a chip on my shoulder.
[00:10:09] Hate to admit it, I wanted to do everything myself. I wanted to learn everything myself. I wanted to have the trial and error. I wanted to figure these things out because I like the challenge. That, by the way, is stupid. All you are doing is keeping yourself stuck. You’re delaying your success. So start, get rid of your ego ’cause it’s not your amigo, and start finding other people that are further ahead on the journey.
[00:10:32] Now, we talked about the brain earlier. And one person giving you the brain transfer. Well, what do you do if you wanna be super successful is you keep climbing the ladder. And in this case you keep climbing the mountain and you say, Hey, who’s at this stage of the journey? How can I get them to transfer their knowledge of how I go on the path to get to this point?
[00:10:54] And then we get there. The person that’s mentoring you and you are working with, they’re, they’re there and we need to go, whoa, who’s there? And it might be that this mentor, if they’re a great mentor, they walk the path with you and you stay with ’em because they’re learning and they’re growing, they’re helping you on journey.
[00:11:10] And it might be that you find another brain to take you on the next leg of the journey, and then you might find another brain to take you on the next leg of the journey and you find another brain. Now, the brutal truth is this, most people think they know it all. Most people think because they read a book about it, that they understand it.
[00:11:32] Most people think, well, yeah, I know I need a mentor. I watch loads of YouTube videos that talked about it before, Adam. I get that. Yeah. But the bottom line is if you haven’t had one, you haven’t actually experienced it. You just heard about it. So what we have to do is like we have to take action. We have to go and find it.
[00:11:50] And then we need to keep going on that journey and we need to stay coachable and keep learning. In fact, this happens a lot. Someone goes a proportion of the journey. And let’s say, let’s say this is building a business. Let’s take building a business and let’s say the top of the mountain is a hundred million pounds business.
[00:12:09] It could be a billion depending on your ambition. And let’s say this is zero in revenue. So you find a mentor to take you to your first million pounds in revenue that gets you here. You didn’t find a new mentor that takes you to 10 million. You find a new mentor that takes you to 25 million and you find a new mentor that takes you to a hundred million.
[00:12:29] Now the problem that many people have is they go from zero to a million and they go to this place. So they, this is you. You go from being here to being here, but the person that took you on the journey is here. Let’s imagine that, and they can take you a lot further. But a lot of problem is a lot of people get to here and then they think they know the rest of the journey.
[00:12:56] I. And we see, I see that a lot, right? So you’ve gotta remain coachable. The way I see it is I work with somebody, you know, I have some great mentors, I’ve had great coaches and have a great respect for everybody that’s helped me on my journey. And I’ve had so many and, and so many amazing people. But I’ve got a mentor that’s done a hundred million pounds, even if I’ve done 50 million pound in revenue per year.
[00:13:19] Well, I’ve done 40 million in a single year, 156 million in sales since I started in business, but somebody else has done a hundred million a year. Well, I ain’t quitting working with that person till they got me to a hundred, right? I want to go all the way. And that’s, uh, that’s what you want to have is like, do I need to find a new mentor or do I need to find somebody that can take me to the next stage of the journey?
[00:13:40] What is it you need to do? But you’ve gotta remain coachable. Just because you start having success very quickly, you can think you know it all, and if you think you know it all, that can keep you stuck. So be open-minded, be coachable. So number five, this one’s pretty simple. I used to get wrapped up in the technical skills.
[00:13:59] It’s like, oh look, I understand. I do the computer. I understand how to do the ad. I gotta understand to do this. I’ve gotta understand to do that. And lots of people do. They get wrapped up in detail. Mini detail, technical skills. It’s like, don’t worry about the technical skills because you can buy the technical skills for nothing.
[00:14:16] There’s really only three skills that you need to really focus on owning on. If you wanna build a great business, and they are marketing, which is getting your message out to market, the art of having conversations and getting those people you talk to, to take a step. Sales, which is the conversion. Of those opportunities and brand building.
[00:14:37] These are the big three that I wish I’d known in my twenties because I would’ve stopped me messing around in all the technical. I’m like, oh, how do I do this ad? How do I do this? Like, how does that work? Et cetera, et cetera. I’d be like, you know what? There’s so many freelancers. Now we can go and hire someone to do a certain element.
[00:14:53] We can hire someone to do a spreadsheet. Don’t be messing around with spreadsheets. If you’re not an accountant. Don’t be messing around with the technical side of ads. Focus instead on getting the message out. Who do you need to get the message out? Pay someone to do it. ’cause I didn’t realize that. I felt like I had to know everything.
[00:15:10] What you really wanna do is you wanna build a successful business. You need to know these three, and you need to pay with your money. And I wish I knew this too. Pay with your money rather than your time. And you will step into your success so much faster, which is technical skills are overrated and moneymaking skills are underrated.
[00:15:31] Focus on the three moneymaking skills, marketing, sales, and branding, and you will ascend up that mountain much quicker. So number six. Your ambition acts like a mirror. I didn’t get this and actually I had a lot of pain with this one. I’ve had experiences where I had, you know, some of my best friends come in and work with me and you know, cause me lots of problems.
[00:15:56] I had people take off me, I had people steal off me. I had people run off on my database, people run off on my clients and I just couldn’t get it. I didn’t understand. It used to drive me crazy, had lots of these different things happen over the years. You know, I had people that criticized me. I had haters.
[00:16:11] I had people that were like, oh, you know, you experience all these kind of things and it’s actually quite normal and people don’t get it. So I’m about to explain to you why that happens just through some brutal experience, and it is that your ambition. Acts as a mirror. If you want to do great things and you want to achieve great things and you start telling everybody that and getting yourself out there, what that does is it sends a signal to other people that, Hey, this is what I’m doing, and that means they’ve gotta look at themselves.
[00:16:43] And a lot of the time they don’t like that. I actually don’t like the fact that they’ve gotta look at themselves. You go, I’m gonna be a millionaire. I remember when I was very young, when I was, uh, very young and I said to people, you know what? I’m gonna be a millionaire. I remember people laughing out loud and Do you know what it was?
[00:16:59] Is they’re laughing at laughing at me. ’cause they’re like, yeah, you’re not gonna do that. But really, you know, they’re so, those same people were just worried. They think that and they think you can’t do it because they can’t do it. Because it’s their frame of reference. The person that laughs at you, if you say, I’m gonna be a millionaire, and somebody laughs at you, the reason that they’re laughing actually has nothing to do with you.
[00:17:22] It’s all about their frame of reference and their belief about the possibilities of that happening. I didn’t get that, and I used to think, whoa, why are they being funny to me? You’re taking it personally. Frankly. Most people don’t care about you. They care about themselves. And when you are out there and you are saying, I’m gonna do this, I’m gonna do this, I’m gonna do that.
[00:17:41] It just makes them feel insecure. It makes them feel less, and the fact you’re making them feel insecure and less means they start being mean to you, and you can’t work it out. So remember. That your ambition acts like a mirror. Share your dreams, your goals, and your ambitions with people that support you and lift you up.
[00:18:00] But you don’t need to go and have conversations with people that are negative, that are gonna pull you down. It’s pointless. You’re just wasting your time. And you can tell me in the comments if you’ve done that, how many of you had it where you’ve got in, shed saying You’ve been excited about it, can’t wait to share it.
[00:18:13] And then someone starts moaning about it and you’re just like, Ugh. It deflates you remember? Anyone trying to pull you down can only pull you down because they’re below you, right? You wanna start working with and spending time with people that lift you up and remember brutal truth, but your ambition acts like a mirror.
[00:18:30] Number seven, and this is our final one, and this is the one that I wish that I would’ve known, right? I wish someone would’ve put their arm around me in my twenties and said, Adam, you know, this is super important because. I didn’t realize this. It took me a while to realize this, but everything can be learned.
[00:18:48] Everything you can achieve what you want, you can be what you want. You can have what you want, as long as you know and understand that whatever it is that you want, learn, it can be learned. As long as you are patient, you are committed, and you’re disciplined, and you’re focused, you can go and you can learn.
[00:19:05] You wanna be a great chef. I spoke to podcast this morning. Paul Ainsworth, great guy. He’s talking about similar things. He is like, you know what? I wanted to be a chef. I committed to be a chef. I was focused about being a chef. I went and I became a great chef. Great, awesome, Paul, right? So you’ve gotta have that focus, that discipline, and go make it happen.
[00:19:22] Wherever you wanna be great at, you can be great at it doesn’t matter how badges suck at the beginning, all that matters is where you are at at the end. So remember the first time you do anything, you’re not gonna be great at, but you then want to just keep going, keep going, keep going. This is some of the best ways to learn mentors and coaches, which we’ve talked about here.
[00:19:43] Cut the learning curve. So if somebody’s done what you want to do, get ’em to tell you how to do it. We talked about transference and knowledge climbing their journey. Number one, training. Train yourself. The best investment you can make is in yourself. And the more you learn, the more you earn. So what do you need to train him?
[00:19:58] What do you want to get better at? This is super important ’cause whatever it’s you wanna accomplish, just train in it. And another note, if you’re a business owner watching this, be training your staff. Get obsessed with training, which is super important. Okay? And number three. Books, resources now, podcasts, right?
[00:20:17] Feed your mind. This is really important. Just be feeding your mind all the time when you get in the car. Be listening, saying, when you’re in the gym, be listening to something. Get focused. And this is gonna be like my top tip for you on this. And we’ve got a book here. Get super focused on topic. So this is what a lot of people do is they just try and consume loads of personal development materials, loads of different books, and they’re reading all this stuff makes ’em feel good.
[00:20:41] Instead of doing that, pick a thing that you love and you are passionate about and let’s just imagine, let’s say. I’ll give you an example. There’s certain things I love. I love public speaking. I love listening to people talking about public speaking techniques. I love that. It’s my passion. I teach it too.
[00:20:59] I, you know, I work with tons of great quality speakers where I show them how to speak their message, communicate their message. I love it. So I love public speaking. I love business, and I love business growth, especially growing businesses. And I’ve also realized the value of leadership. So you’ve gotta be a better leader.
[00:21:15] So what I do is I’ll pick one of these topics, let’s say leadership in this or public speaking, whatever one, and then I literally drill down into it. I’m reading every single book on leadership. I’m listening to the podcast on leadership. I’m watching YouTube videos on leadership. I’m literally taking training on leadership.
[00:21:33] I’m talking to the best coaches on leadership. Why? Because if I drill down into that subject, I get really good at leadership. I think rather than going broad. That’s what people do is like, oh, pick your thing, go deep on it. Become the researcher. When you become the researcher, you get all the materials, you research into everything, and then you can start speaking about, you can become the reporter.
[00:21:55] Eventually you become the expert where you can be the educator on it too. If you go deep enough into the subject. Anyone can become an expert at anything. As long as they’re committed, they’re focused, they’re disciplined. They’re my seven brutal truths. I wish someone had said that to me in my twenties.
[00:22:10] If someone says to me, Adam, go deep. That would’ve really, really helped me. Hopefully that’s really helped you. I’d love to hear. I. In the comments about which of these seven resonated with you, you’ve obviously watched all the way to the end, so you are an A player. So go and comment a player in the comments that allows me to see that you’ve watched all the way through.
[00:22:30] If you’re listening on the podcast, you know, hopefully you really enjoyed this too. And remember you can go and. Check these videos out on YouTube. You can see me doing the illustrations and things as well, uh, which is a cool thing to do, and comment a plus. So we know you’ve watched all the way to the end.
[00:22:45] Thanks again. Well done for watching all the way through to the seven brutal truths that I wish I knew in your twenties. And if you’re a business owner that wants help grow your business, go to the description, check it out. There’s some resources there where we can start to work further with you and your business.